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Hammish Posts: 5
6/4/2017
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Given the current state of affairs (and continuing even as more systems open up, IMO) I feel like it might be time to address the concept of artifacts and research labs. If unique/rare units/upgrades were not quite as powerful as they are, but given the strength they exhibit in the current game limiting access to them seems... very heavily skewed. I say this as a person who is an Earth ruler and has access to the artifact, even.
Given this, I would suggest that methods of research be put into the game that do not involve artifacts, but are limited in certain regards so as to not utterly devalue artifacts. I have a few ideas regarding this, listed in order of what I think might work best.
1: Give corporate HQs an option to produce research toward an artifact themselves, INSTEAD of producing a raw good. Make it a fraction of what a normal research lab might produce, perhaps 10-20%, but at the same operating cost as a regular lab. This would allow any corporation to engage in research at what would still be a fairly heavy price, but would be a viable option in terms of cost-effectiveness once the ocrowd on artifacts hit 400%. This would also leave the value of artifacts themselves intact, because while they might cost more, they will still turn out artifacts 5x or more quickly and thus allowing people to sink money into much faster production if desired.
2: Give corporate HQs a small research trickle at HQ10. Canonically it would seem our HQs have R&D facilities, and they wouldn't have much to do once they reached max level. With this option you would want to make the trickle a much slower thing, given no cost to it.
3: The ability to build research labs in any city for a very modest production. This is just a variation on #1; instead of limiting the production to the HQ (and thus capping how much a non-artifact-holding person could produce), instead it could be that labs could be built anywhere and operate as if they were on a 1-2 base resource tile for the normal operating cost. This shares the same limitations and balancing as the first option, in that it might be cost-efficient in an HQ city (with all the cost bonuses you get there) but it will never produce quickly.
Just ideas, though! At the end of the day I would like to see the massive power wielded by artifact holders spread to the many, is the point... but while leaving the the valuable nature of artifact nodes intact but slightly lessened.
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Teluna Posts: 9
6/4/2017
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I definitely support the idea of making artifacts more accessible considering their significance. I have no problem with the possible solutions you gave, but just to add another one to the pile: What about spawning more than one artifact location per system? Can still limit the high yield artifact to one location, but maybe throw in a couple 2-4s on other planets as well. This keeps some element of risk to research while still allowing more people the chance to get some of those rare units.
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ChaChaCharms Posts: 167
6/4/2017
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If anything an additional site or 2 would be more than sufficient.... the issue is you would have the same people getting the research done due to the high impact they have in the game. People will fight for them and part of the point of the game is to fight for resources or politically decide how to handle the overcrowding 
--
Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can’t see where it keeps its brain..
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Vulpex Posts: 390
6/4/2017
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If you need more artifacts work towards opening up new systems.
You can end up with 2-3 artifact sites in the new system and that will be a game changer.
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Hammish Posts: 5
6/4/2017
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And if the next system spawns zero, or another single deposit at relatively low output?
I mean, I can just see an endgame system where a person or group could literally control the output of every single artifact source in the game, using it to maintain supremacy through the raw economy efficiency and power efficiency that unique units have. A person that has access to artifacts and unique units will have an army that is at -least- three times more potent than someone who does not for the same cost; that's a pretty huge margin. If unique/special units were maybe twice as powerful, or had their upkeep adjusted to cut down on the relative power, that would be a different matter.
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Doctor Dread Administrator Posts: 1478
6/4/2017
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What really needs to happen is that artifacts need to become a "product" of sorts. You can't sell it or buy it to cities but it stacks like a product called "Artifacts" . The research lab you're using now will take several turns to produce 1 quantity of the stuff. Then you can take your artifacts to your HQ and turn them into any type of item or effect you want. Corp HQ can make actual items using artifacts as ac component like a comp factory.
All this so that artifacts can now be used in small quantities as a form of premium in game currency. I can hand small quantities out as rewards for quests ect. you can even trade them AND... you can also RAID them like any other product. Right now theres no way to steal items or artifacts. If they were made into a product like this, you could. I canalso trickle them into the game like someone mentioned in small amounts.
I plan to switch them to this one day.
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Vulpex Posts: 390
6/4/2017
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Yup this is the endgame - in the meantime artifacts do fulfill their role as the ultimate aspirational item - want them either you pay (a lot) or you fight for them.
NB - I'm an optimist and have seen up to 3 artifacts per system in Beta though that might have been toned down. There is nothing wrong with opening up new systems!
A single person could never project enough power to control all artifact sites.
A single group... well now that's an interesting idea.
edited by Vulpex on 6/4/2017
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